


Who are you, Doctor?

by JTtrack2



Series: 13 and Yaz [2]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Birthday, F/F, Fluff, Meet the Family, thasmin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-28
Updated: 2018-12-28
Packaged: 2019-09-29 11:14:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17202449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JTtrack2/pseuds/JTtrack2
Summary: Team Tardis return to the Khan family flat to celebrate Yasmin's birthday and her Nani has some questions.





	Who are you, Doctor?

**Author's Note:**

> This is a follow-up to The Most Important Day of the Year. It can probably stand alone though.

"Listen to me, Yasmin Khan," her Nani reached over and placed her hand over Yaz's just as she was about to shift the car into reverse. "We're not going anywhere until you tell me what's _really_ going on."

Yaz's chest tightened. "I thought Mum told you." Her palm began to sweat against the gear shift. "We're... dating."

It felt like a lie. Not because they had only actually been on one date, just the night before. It felt like a lie because "dating" didn't even come close to describing her relationship with the Doctor, even if it was only in the past 12 hours that they had dared to begin to articulate it.

The Doctor seemed to share some of the same thought process as Yaz, only unlike Yaz, the Doctor lacked a social filter. "Technically, we're intending to date. I'm not sure last night counted as a date, really?" The Doctor scrunched her nose in confusion. "Umbreen," she leaned forward from her spot in the back seat and continued, "Is it still a date if you don't know if the other person fancies you _before_ you leave the Tardis?" The Doctor caught Yaz's wide eyes in the rear-view mirror. "Er, home. Before you leave home?"

"Yasmin, I may be old, but I've not lost all my marbles yet," she pursed her lips as she stared intently at her granddaughter. "Your mother told me you two were together. What I need _you_ to tell me is how on Earth you and your girlfriend and your mates were at my wedding over seventy years ago."

Yaz swore her heart stop beating for a moment. She opened and closed her mouth three times, unable to form any words.

She hadn't forgotten her visit to her grandmother's wedding day - _how could she ever?_ \- but she hadn't considered the possibility that her Nani would piece it all together. After all, there didn't seem to be any spark of recognition several months ago when her grandmother examined the traces of the mehendi her great-grandmother had drawn on her hands. And with all of the adventures she'd been on since, she'd never taken the time to consider the possibility that her Nani would meet the Doctor, Ryan, and Graham all at once.

 

Yaz had decided to arrive at her family's flat an hour before the others. A few moments of watching the Doctor ramble on to Graham and Ryan, trying awkwardly and excitedly but indirectly to answer Graham's questions about their evening while Ryan tried to catch up, Yaz decided it would be best to have a little time with her parents alone before the others came around. The Doctor insisted they needed to get a few hours of shut-eye and then pop back over to Sheffield on the same-day, no hanging around the vortex to rest up. Something about complications with moving through very proximate space and time that Graham suspected boiled down to the Doctor just being too excited to wait for her human companions to properly recharge.

"You nervous?" Ryan asked her as they headed to bed.

"It's not nerves really, it's..." Yaz considered the question for a moment. "You know that feeling, when you're standing on a ledge looking down, and you're nowhere close to falling off... there's no real danger, but just looking down is enough to make you feel like you're already falling?"

"Listen Yaz, I'm happy for ya, mate, but you don't have to go and get all romantic," Ryan earned himself a playful slap on the shoulder.

"I didn't mean falling in love, ya idiot. It's just, you know... my parents have known for a while that I fancied girls, but they still have certain expectations for what my life will look like. They know we've gone traveling with the Doctor, sort of investigatin' things for a couple days here and there... but they're going to have so many questions and how do I even begin? How could they ever understand all of this? Any of this, really?"

"What do parents ever understand anyway?" Ryan shrugged. "Maybe they'll just be glad to know that you're happy?"

"Yeah," Yaz sighed and gave her friend a small smile. "Maybe.

 

To Yaz's surprise, the conversation had gone better than she could have hoped. Her parents had been alarmed when she first opened the door.

"Yaz, happy b..." her mother broke off her greeting as she moved to peer around her daughter into the hallway. "Happy birthday," she finally said after she recovered herself and wrapped her eldest daughter in a hug.

"We thought you were bringing friends?" her father asked as he came from the kitchen to greet her, his eyebrows knitted in a look of concern that reminded Yaz of the look he would give her when she came home from school sulking. She suddenly realised how much it must have pained her father to see his child lonely and unhappy and she turned from her mum to wrap him a tight hug.

"They'll be here soon," She leaned back and smiled up at her father. "I just wanted to see you guys on my own first."

Her father studied her for a moment. He wasn't sure he remembered the last time his daughter's eyes had shone quite so brightly when she smiled.

As expected, the kettle hadn't even begun to boil before her mother had begun to ask questions about The Doctor. Yaz answered them as honestly as she could. _Yes, we're seeing each other. But it's new, Mum, I promise I wasn't lying the last time you asked.... We met, well... on the job, I guess? She helped me sort out a bit of a strange incident on a train..._ She found that the less information she gave, the more her father was willing to fill in the blanks himself, all too happy to imagine the Doctor as some sort of paranormal private investigator.

"I'm going to go pick up your Nani," her mother announced after they had finished their tea, though Yasmin suspected the interrogation wouldn't ever truly end.

Ryan, Graham, and the Doctor arrived moments after Najia left followed by Sonya a few minutes later.

"Happy bir..." Yaz couldn't help but laugh as her sister unwittingly acted just like their mother. Only Sonya's surprise wasn't from the lack of company, but rather the abundance of company. "Happy birthday, Yaz. I didn't know you were inviting your," she paused before her last word, taking in Yaz and the Doctor's joined hands and raising an eyebrow. "Friends."

"You remember Ryan, Graham, and the Doctor?"

"Of course," she shifted her gaze from her sister to Ryan, looking him over from head to toe. "Couldn't forget." 

She sat down on the sofa beside Ryan and began to chat with him, ignoring her sister's presence entirely after that.

"Something about her reminds me of King James," Graham whispered to Yaz and the Doctor with a chuckle.

Yaz finally began to truly relax as she sat back and listened to her father explain to the Doctor something about the council and a tree and his theory of the truth about the situation.

"You know," Graham whispered to her. "I'd never seen the Doctor truly nervous before today. I thought she was going to be sick on our way up the elevator. I reckon this is the first time she's been brought home to meet the family."

Yaz squeezed the Doctor's hand. The idea that someone who had faced some of the darkest forces in the universe could be nervous about seeing her parents was as endearing as it was hilarious. So when Najia and her mother came through the door seconds later, the first thing they saw was Yasmin holding the Doctor's hand and absolutely beaming at her.

Umbreen froze just in front of the doorway, her mouth hanging open.

Yaz turned at the sound of her mum closing the door and the air left her lungs when she saw the look on her Nani's face. Her mum had said she'd tell her, that she was certain the news wouldn't bother her as long as her favourite granddaughter was happy. But the look of shock on her grandmother's face said otherwise...

The Doctor felt Yaz's hand go slack and turned to see what was wrong. Unlike Yaz, the Time Lord immediately realised their mistake. She dropped Yasmin's hand and sprang out of her seat so quickly she startled everyone and Sonya took the occasion to grasp onto Ryan's bicep in exaggerated surprise.

"Hi, Yaz's nan, why don't you take my seat?" the Doctor tentatively put her hand on Umbreen's arm, trying to guide her towards the sofa. Still in a state of shock, Umbreen let the Doctor lead her, but stopped just before the sofa and turned to look up at her.

"Surely, you should call me Umbreen," she said firmly, recovering her senses and a newfound sense of indignation. She locked eyes with the Doctor for a long moment before taking a seat next to her granddaughter. She took a deep breath and turned to Yaz with a smile. "Happy birthday, Yasmin. You look more beautiful every year," she told her placing a kiss on her cheek.

"Thank you, Nani, I'm so glad you're here," Yaz squeezed her grandmother's hand, feeling herself relax. Her grandmother's shock had seemed to pass quickly enough, maybe it's just one of those things, where something takes you by surprise even when you expect it. _She must understand,_ Yaz told herself, _after all, she once loved a man everyone said she shouldn't._

The next couple of hours were a blur of birthday cake, ice cream, a rather long monologue on ice cream (the Doctor), awkward attempts at flirting (her sister), a detailed argument against self-driving buses (her father and Graham), opening gifts, and updates on her mum's new job (better than the last would ever have been, even sans giant mutant spiders). Yasmin found herself sitting on the sofa, leaning into the Doctor's side and watching her family and her Tardis fam mingle. She had a scarf around her neck that Graham and Ryan had picked up for her at the England match the night before. "We can't get her anything that would compare to what the Doc can offer, but we could help her stay warm, " Graham had argued like a true grandad.

 _Maybe this could work,_ Yaz thought, _maybe I don't need these two parts of me to fit together perfectly, as long as I can share parts of them with each other._

The Doctor, too, had relaxed a little as the hours passed. But she kept watching Umbreen out of the corner of her eye. And while Yaz had thought nothing of it when her Nani announced that she wanted Yasmin to drive her home - _and bring your friend, we can talk on the way_ \- she didn't think twice about grabbing the keys and heading out the door. The Doctor, on the other hand, knew a trap when she saw one. Half the time she still chose to run directly into the trap, but she had gotten pretty good at recognizing them. And this, she knew immediately, was a trap.

"What I need _you_ to tell me is how on Earth you and your girlfriend and your mates were at my wedding over seventy years ago."

The Doctor was impressed, really. Umbreen was every bit as stoic and determined as she had been as a young woman. Not many people, when faced with such impossible evidence of time travel, manage to really wrap their head around it. Most find a way to ignore any information that so spectacularly contradicts their understanding of how the world works. Those that _do_ manage to see the evidence for what it is don't tend to have the composure to sit around politely eating cake while waiting for answers.

Umbreen turned to face the backseat now. "I'll admit, I always thought it was a wonderful coincidence that my Yasmin looked so much like that distant cousin who invited herself to my wedding. But I don't suspect there are two people in this word quite like you, Doctor." Yaz finally remembered how to breathe, as her Nani's words echoed the same thought she'd had on so many occasions. "Who _are_ you, Doctor? How is this possible?"

Yaz saw the tears glistening at the edge of Umbreen's eyes. She silently cursed herself for putting her in this position, making her relive her past love and loss, looking into the eyes of the woman who had blessed her marriage decades ago yet hadn't aged a day. Before the Doctor could respond, Yaz made a decision.

"Doctor," she turned in her seat, looking back at the Time Lord whose green eyes shone with empathy and regret. "Can I ask you a favour?"

The Doctor's lips turned up a bit as she shrugged her shoulders. "Always," she replied, just barely above a whisper.

"Can I show her the Tardis?"

The Doctor nodded as Umbreen looked between them.

"You know, Umbreen, I think Yaz really takes after you. But there's no way she would have waited this long to start demanding answers," the Doctor smiled as she managed to elicit a small chuckle from the woman in the passenger seat. "I'll try to explain everything, but I think Yaz's right, it would be a lot easier to show than to tell. We're parked just around the corner."

The three of them got out of the car and the Doctor offered Umbreen her arm as they walked down the street, coming to a stop a few feet in front of the Tardis. Yaz began to panic a little, wondering if this was really a good idea. The Tardis could be quite a shock, and at her Nani's age...

Before she could imagine the worst, Umbreen interrupted her thoughts. "This hasn't been here before and it's a ridiculous place for it," she said gesturing to the Tardis and looking up at the Doctor. "Everybody has a mobile these days, there's no use for it."

Yaz was suddenly reminded that while her body had aged, her Nani was still the fiery, defiant young woman she had seen marry across the new border of Pakistan and India.

"What is it really, then?" The Doctor couldn't help but smile. _Is it any surprise that his woman's granddaughter would grow up to be a police officer?_

"It's my Tardis," the Doctor replied, pulling out her key and stepping forward to unlock the door.

The Doctor turned and took Umbreen's hand, leading her into the Tardis with Yaz close beside her. "Welcome to my home," the Doctor said. "To _our_ home," she added smiling at Yaz.

Maybe it was the soft lights of the Tardis, but as Yaz looked at her grandmother's face she swore she looked at least ten years younger. Her eyes sparkled and her smile stretched from ear to ear in a look of awe and wonder. She looked carefully around the room before her eyes settled on the Doctor. "Who _are_ you, Doctor?" she asked again.

The Doctor smiled softly, "I'm just a traveler... in space _and_ time."

"I asked her to go, to take us to your wedding," Yaz stepped forward, taking her Nani's free hand. "I wanted to know more about the watch that you gave me and I'm so sorry, I know I should have waited for you to tell me when you were ready, and..."

To Yaz's surprise, Umbreen started to laugh. Her laughter echoed around the control room as Yaz looked to the Doctor to see if she had understood what was happening. Maybe the shock of the Tardis had been delayed, maybe her Nani was losing it.

After a moment, her laughter died down and Umbreen looked her granddaughter in the eye. "Yasmin Khan, you are such a clever girl, surely you can see? You _had_ to go back, I _needed_ you to be at my wedding. I can't pretend to understand all of _this_ ", she said, looking around the control room. "How the past can be changed... but I know that there was no one else to perform my marriage. If the Doctor hadn't arrived, if you hadn't been there... I don't know if I would have survived. When Prem told me to leave, if he hadn't been my husband, perhaps I wouldn't have listened... I would have never made it to Lahore, to Sheffield..." Umbreen's eyes were again filled with tears, but an unmistakable joy shone through the sadness of her recollection. "At least, I would never have been able to say that I had been married to such a remarkable man."

She looked between the Doctor and Yaz before continuing. "Though it does drive me mad that my mother was right."

"What about?" the Doctor asked with a smile.

"When she tried to talk me out of marrying, telling me we were cursed. She said you weren't suitable to officiate our wedding because you were clearly in love with _my cousin_. She was still learning to accept me marrying a Hindu, she wasn't ready to accept that too." She cupped Yaz's face in her hand and looked her granddaughter directly in the eye. "But I've disagreed with my mother on many things, as you saw for yourselves. And I believe, my dear Yasmin, that you have excellent taste."

Yaz pulled her grandmother into a hug, feeling a weight she hadn't even realised she was carrying released from her shoulders.

"Now, I suppose you should drive me home and get back to rescue Ryan from your sister. You can come around for tea soon to tell me more about all of this."

"Tea at Yaz's Nan's?!" the Doctor beamed. "Brilliant!"

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I have fallen so far into the Thasmin rabbit hole it's not even funny, but at least there's good company. :)


End file.
